This disclosure relates to a method of operating a data processing system and to the data processing system. In one embodiment, the disclosure provides an interaction design for Gantt chart keyboard navigation on task chart patterns.
A Gantt chart is a type of bar chart that may be used to illustrate a project schedule. FIG. 1 shows an example of a task-oriented Gantt chart 10. The Gantt chart 10 includes a plurality of tasks 12 and a plurality of constraints 14, where each constraint 14 connects two tasks 12. Gantt charts can be used to illustrate the start and finish dates of terminal elements and summary elements of a project. Terminal elements and summary elements include the work breakdown structure of the project. Task-oriented Gantt charts also show the dependency (precedence) relationships between activities (tasks). Gantt charts can be used to show current schedule status using percent-complete shadings and a vertical current line.
In the conventional presentation of a task-oriented Gantt chart, there may be issues with the on-screen navigation of elements within the Gantt chart. Solutions for Gantt chart navigation already exist, but only apply to the Gantt grid part, and not to the Gantt sheet part. Due to this restriction they only allow a user, in a task-oriented Gantt chart, to access the various tasks, but not the constraints. Hence, current methods of presenting and navigating a task-oriented Gantt chart do not fully allow access to the Gantt chart data with a keyboard, and additionally they can lose the logic existing within the Gantt chart of the constraints between tasks when navigating with the keyboard.